Business Meeting:

President: It was a very cold and icy evening when Linda Anderson called the meeting to order at 7:20 at the home of Clayton Peterson, 1202 21st Street.

Secretary: Diane Oestreich emailed the January minutes.

Vice President: Pam Saunders was absent but has arranged upcoming meetings. – The March 18 meeting will be held at the Gas & Electric Credit Union, 2300 4th Avenue, hosted by Daryl Empen. On April 15, we will meet at the restored-for-apartments Voss Brothers Lofts, 2125 3rd Avenue. If an apartment is vacant, we may be able to tour it.

Treasurer: Daryl Empen reported a balance of $2831.95 after paying dues to Landmarks Illinois & RICHS and reimbursing Martha Dismer for the newsletter postage and copying.

Corresponding Secretaries: Martha Dismer published the February newsletter and also included the membership and Old House Journal solicitation and a return envelope. This saved others a great deal of work! Clayton sent thank you’s to Marion Meginnis & Jack Haberman for hosting last month’s meeting at the Gateway Redevelopment Group (GRG) salvage store.

Diane moved, seconded by Jaan Sturgis, to send a $25 donation to GRG. Diane will provide Daryl with the mailing information.

Committee Reports/Business

1. Nominating committee for February elections:
   Clayton made the report for the nominating committee. He said that all previous officers had agreed to serve again and that no one else had contacted the committee offering to serve despite publicity in the agenda, minutes and newsletter. Linda asked for nominations from the floor and there were none. Terry Anderson moved, seconded by Faye Anderson, to accept and elect the slate as recommended. Vote was unanimous with one abstention.

   Jaan Sturgis said that, since we never seem to change officers, we should amend our constitution to elect officers every five years. However there was no agreement with this. Jaan felt the organization became stagnant when we didn’t change officers; however Daryl noted that new people have stepped up to take responsibility for different committees, notably our website with Pete Cone and Diana Alm’s initiatives with Neighborhood Partners. It was agreed that we need to cultivate these potential officers.

   Among leadership positions that need to be filled are:
   Awards chair -- responsibility for writing and preparing news releases and coordinating press activities.
   Landmarks chair -- to research and write landmark applications.
   Walking Tour coordinator -- Represent RIPS and coordinate event at Long View Park Centennial Celebration this summer.

2. RIPS website:
   The audio Watch Hill Tour is now available for download on our website www.rockislandpreservation.org. Individual files are there to be downloaded; we may end up putting a single large ‘zip’ file with all the houses together. It was also suggested that this would be an excellent topic for a press release (when the weather is nice enough that people even consider walking tours.)

3. Endangered Buildings; Preservation Projects:
   Martha noted that several historic Rock Island buildings were toured recently by a non-profit group that builds artists’ housing and studio space in old commercial or school buildings. This may provide an adaptive reuse for one or more buildings in the downtown vicinity.

   In other updates, the former Larson Funeral Home is for sale. The former Christian Science Church has been purchased and boarded. Rumor has it that someone has bought it and other churches throughout the Midwest but has no immediate plans.

4. Hauberg Landscape Walking Tour:
   No action

5. Awards – chairman needed:
   Diane has emailed some neighborhood representatives asking for suggestions but has had no response. She will provide the current list, which is not very long, to Daryl for photographs for the slide show which he will present at our March meeting.

6. Neighborhood Partners:
   Diana said that she would like to continue serving as the Neighborhood Partners representative for another year as her idea to encourage neighborhood identification is getting underway. Terry Anderson also expressed an interest in serving on the NP committee. We are allowed to send two representatives to the quarterly meetings. Anyone else interested in serving is urged to call Linda or Diana.

7. Summer Projects:
   There was a consensus that, considering the amount of work required for Awards in May and the amount of work many of us will be involved with for the July Longview Centennial, we not undertake any major efforts this summer. We will plan to do a walking tour (much like we did in Watch Hill) in September. It was suggested that this could complement the NP’s work to build neighborhood identity. Linda will also check to see if there are appropriate programs funded by the Illinois Humanities Council that we could take advantage of for October.

   Diane suggested that we could make color note cards of the houses featured on our tours. She brought examples to demonstrate the idea. Our cost and risk would be minimal, but this would likely wait until our next tour. It was suggested that this would be an excellent thing for the LongView Centennial observance. We could sell a packet of cards with contemporary and historic views that should appeal to many. One suggestion was a picture of the very popular and unique calendar garden, with the date of the Centennial displayed. The actual celebration is a week later.

Adjourn on a motion by Terry, seconded by Clayton